FIELD OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates to a two-stage process for the decomposition of the hemicelluloses of xylane-containing natural products for the purpose of realizing xylose and/or xylitol. More especially this invention relates to a process for contacting xylane-containing natural products with an alkali metal hydroxide solution, extracting the residue obtained therefrom, feeding the extracted residue to a subsequent stage wherein the same is contacted with an acid and extracting the residue resulting therefrom. This invention is particularly concerned with such a two-stage decomposition performed in a series of reactors containing conveyor devices having different conveying performances.